EXCLUSIVE: Poland’s Europe minister ARKADIUSZ MULARCZYK insists Germany must pay £1.1TRILLION in reparations for damage wrought by the Nazis as his country marks anniversary of Hitler’s attack on Gdansk which triggered WWII in 1939
- Attack on Poland began on the Westerplatte peninsula in what is now Gdansk
- Poland’s right-wing government previously made formal request for reparations
Eighty-four years ago today, Nazi Germany‘s attack on Poland kicked off the Second World War.
Adolf Hitler’s troops broke through Polish border crossings and launched naval, air and ground attacks on the Westerplatte peninsula in what is now Gdansk.
Once Poland had been subdued, the Nazis set about terrorising its citizens and would later go on to build the death camps where many of the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust would meet their fate.
Last year, the country’s right-wing government made a formal request to Germany that it pay £1.1trillion in reparations for their six-year occupation.
Germany insisted the matter was settled decades ago, but, writing today for MailOnline, Poland’s Europe minister ARKADIUSZ MULARCZYK argues his country deserves the compensation.
Historical memory is key to national identity. Anniversaries of and monuments to events, battles, deaths and cultural figures in a nation’s past are celebrated and commemorated because they reinforce that nation’s identity, and what it means to be a member of that nation. They remind us of that which should never be forgotten, honouring the memory of those it represents – even if it is hard.
One such monument stands in Gdansk. The Defenders of the Coast, on the Westerplatte Peninsula, marks where the German army, at 4:45am on the 1st September 1939, invaded Poland and started the Second World War.
The monument watches over the harbour where the Polish garrison bravely fought against the invading Germans for seven days, with Major Sucharski holding the town while the German army poured across the Polish countryside towards Warsaw.
Every year, at 4:45am, the town of Westerplatte commemorates that fateful morning, beginning with the sounding of a siren and the singing of Poland Is Not Yet Lost, the Polish national anthem. It is a solemn ceremony, remembering the consequences of illegal wars and invasions.
Now, as Europe looks east to see these consequences once more with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, ceremonies like those at Westerplatte are all the more significant. As my country’s president Andrzej Duda said at last year’s ceremony, ‘our task is to remember history, including World War II, which is a lesson for the whole world.’
As hard as it is, remembering the Second World War is essential. What followed the attack on Westerplatte was six years of terror, culminating in the Holocaust, genocide, ethnic cleansing, and the attempted eradication of the Polish and Polish Jews. The Polish nation was, once again, to be wiped off the map.
Remembering the Second World War means remembering not only the scale of destruction caused by the most brutal regime the world has ever seen, but also remembering the people and individuals who suffered at the hands of German barbarity.
Many of these victims are still alive to tell the stories of what they witnessed, keeping alive the stories of those they saw murdered while still suffering material loss and physical harm. They never received the compensation they are owed.
Poland suffered tremendously at the hands of Germany, the most out of all European states. It took 30 years for Poland to return to pre-war population levels and GDP figures. Our nation is still healing and every Polish family suffered. Permanent reminders of the horrors of war can be seen across Poland from the German death camps to memorials on street corners. The Poles and Polish Jews who were murdered will always be remembered. Our legacy must be, however painful it is, to maintain these sites and to educate people so that the evils of the Holocaust are never repeated, and remain firmly in the past – for Poland and the rest of the world.
Despite the tragic loss of human potential that affected Poland for decades, the redevelopment of Poland has accelerated in recent years. We are proud to stand side by side with Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression, and our nation has warmly welcomed Ukrainian refugees as they flee Putin’s wrath. We have bolstered our armed forces and supplied the Ukrainian military, whilst growing our own to ensure we never suffer the pain of occupation ever again. Our economy has become the most successful economy in Europe since the fall of the Soviet Union, to the extent that it is predicted Poland’s economy will overtake that of France by the end of the decade.
Our successes, true as they are, are bittersweet when one thinks how far we could have progressed were it not for the Second World War. This is why, one year ago today, the Polish Government published The Report on the Losses Sustained by Poland as a Result of German Aggression and Occupation during the Second World War.
The report makes it clear that, over the course of six years of German occupation, over five million Polish citizens died, of whom three million were Jewish. A further six million were lost to deportation, displacement and slave labour, along with 196,000 Polish children who were kidnapped and taken to Germany in an attempt to ‘Aryanise’ them. Of these, only 30,000 returned.
Poland’s borders – under threat once again from Belarusian subversion and Russian aggression – were shifted westward as a result of the War, and over 78,000km2 of Polish territory was lost, an area equivalent to the Benelux region.
As a consequence of the loss of life, financial damage, destruction of infrastructure, theft of state assets, and irreversible cultural devastation that Poland suffered, Germany caused the equivalent loss of £1.1 trillion. Since the total was published in September 2022, this figure has not been contested. This is down to the remarkable achievements of the experts who wrote the report and the accepted international models they used to calculate Poland’s losses.
Looking back on the anniversary of the invasion of Poland, and the publication of the report, we see once again the domination of one state by another in an attempt to prevent justice being done. Recognising the role that closing historical chapters can play, Poland has tried, since the report was published, to open a dialogue with Germany to resolve this issue. However, Germany refuses to discuss the compensation the Polish people are owed, with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock stating the issue is ‘closed’, and German ambassadors being instructed to ignore our ambassadors.
Any claim that the issue of compensation is closed is a deliberate and dangerous misreading of history, based on false information and wilful ignorance. Typically, Germany’s position rests on the fabricated existence of a waiver from 1953 from Poland’s Communist Prime Minister at the time, apparently relinquishing Poland’s claim to compensation. However, in April of this year, Poland’s Council of Ministers passed a resolution reaffirming the reality that Poland has never relinquished these claims. This follows a resolution passed by our Sejm in 2004 stating the same.
When presented with this fact, Germany then resorts to the Two-Plus-Four Agreement of 1990, which saw Germany reunited and, supposedly, settled Germany’s international obligations regarding the Second World War. Yet, despite gaining independence a year before this agreement in 1989, Poland was excluded from the process by which this agreement came about, and was never given the autonomy necessary to settle the topic of war compensation. Any reliance on this treaty disrespects Poland’s position as a sovereign nation, capable of negotiating its own affairs on the international stage.
The issue of war compensation is at the forefront of the international agenda, as we all come together to force Russia to atone for its terrible and destructive invasion of Ukraine. But nothing happens in international affairs without negotiation and dialogue. It is important that, to ensure European solidarity, and send the message to Russia that illegal wars cannot go unaddressed, Germany takes the necessary steps to discuss this issue openly and honestly with us.
Arkadiusz Mularczyk is the Polish secretary of state for Europe.